The druid class has the worst starting deck of all the classes. Thus, people who try out a druid may be discouraged by the starter deck. However, the druid class can be really great if you know how to build your own decks. You unlock really important cards every even-level between level 2 and level 10. You need to level up to 10 before you can create a viable druid deck to start going into PVP in “play” mode.

This guide is currently on my blog, which is easier for clicking on the various links and has better formatting overall. You can read it here: http://www.restokin.com/2013/09/hearthstone-druid-deck-basics/

• More generally, Hearthpwn is a fairly comprehensive resource. http://www.hearthpwn.com/

• This includes the Hearthstone Wiki that has pretty good definitions of various aspects of the game that may help with learning the basics. http://hearthstone.gamepedia.com/Hearthstone_Wiki

• The Wowhead crew has launched their new hearthstone site, HearthHead. This includes a Tool for practicing choosing arena cards. http://www.hearthhead.com/There are several types of cards available as druid class cards:

• Spell damage cards: Moonfire, starfire, starfall, swipe, and wrath

• Minion cards: druid of the claw, ancient of lore, keeper of the grove, ironbark protector, ancient of war, cenarius, force of nature

• Cards that buff minions: Mark of the wild, power of the wild, savage roar, Mark of nature, soul of the forest,

• Remove opponent minions: Naturalize (note that wrath and starfall now only do damage against minions)

• Card draw: Several abilities have secondary bonuses allowing us to draw more cards: wrath, nourish, ancient of lore, and wild growth (If you cast wild growth when you have 10 mana, it lets you draw a card instead).

• There are also many neutral minions available to all playersDecision points in building a deck:

• Spells vs minions – The druid deck works well if you have a mix of minions and spells. Going too spell heavy or too minion heavy may actually hurt the druid deck at beginner levels, since your options start fairly limited. Spells such as starfall and swipe that help to clear the board are especially vital in controlling the board and gaining an advantage over your opponent.

• Choose 1 of 2 cards: Many advanced druid cards let you choose one of two effects, such as choosing between taunt and charge, or choosing between gaining mana/health and gaining cards. You want to pick up several of these flexible cards to allow for better adapting to the situation. This is especially true once you unlock premium cards.

• Card draw power: Basic druid decks are often bad when you run low on cards. So, the ability to draw more cards is vital for a druid deck to be successful. Minions that allow for drawing cards (such as novice engineers) can be vital for getting card draws without losing board presence. The Gadgetzan Auctioneer can be very powerful in a spell heavy druid deck for getting card draws. Cards like wrath and starfire that both do damage and draw cards can often be better than cards like nourish that only draw cards.

• Spell damage buffs: Cards like swipe and starfire benefit greatly from spell power buffs, allowing you to hit substantially harder than you would otherwise. Minions such as dalaran mage with their +1 spell damage buff combo well with druid decks.

• Controlling the board: Being able to contain and control enemy minions is important. So, cards with silence such as ironbeak owl or keeper of the grove are good additions to a druid deck and can often turn the tide of battle. Natualize is powerful for killing legendary or high mana cost minions, but letting your opponent draw 2 cards is a huge disadvantage – this means you only want to remove legendary threats, and not small threats, with this card.

• Buffing minions: Druids can do well with strategies that involve controlling the board with several minions and then buffing them up. This makes druids an ideal candidate for “murloc decks”. Cards and minions that buff other minions are powerful (e.g., raid leader, shattered sun cleric, power of the wild, savage roar, soul of the forest).

• How defensive? Cards that heal, taunt, or otherwise protect you can be good additions to the deck. However, unless healing touches are well timed (e.g., played right after your opponent exhausted their hand), they may just delay your loss since they don’t give you board control. Instead of having Healing Touches, I run with Ancient of Lore minions and often will use the draw card effect instead of the healing effect if the heal won’t give me an advantage. Cards like Druid of the Claw are very versatile, offering either charge or taunt depending on how aggressive or defensive you want to play.

• Mana control: I have had mixed success with cards like innervate and wild growth. While they can help you get out big minions quickly, I often find that my big minions get turned into sheep and frogs, since players will often have removal in their hand to deal with big threats early in the game. Without big legendary cards, I don’t find that innervate fits well into how I personally play my deck. However, others playing aggressive decks have found ways of using innervate to get more early medium-sized minions out to control the board.

• Going aggro: An aggressive style of play involving early-game aggressive play. You can read more about “going aggro” here: http://hearthstone.blizzpro.com/2013/08/23/the-anatomy-of-an-aggro-deck-in-hearthstone/

Example Druid Decks:

For people starting out without many of the premium cards, using the basic druid starter deck is pretty terrible. So, the goal should be for you to create a custom deck as early as possible when you play a druid.

Level 1 druid deck with no premium cards:

• Practice Mode Minion Buff deck. http://www.hearthpwn.com/decks/8303-druid-level-1-practice-mode-deck
• You will want to replace cards with new abilities as you level. Spells like swipe and starfire are really important to add to your deck as you level up.
Level 10 druid budget druid deck with no premium cards

• Well-rounded control deck, with 4 common premium cards only. http://www.hearthpwn.com/decks/8306-druid-advanced-starting-deck
• Another option that has more common premium cards: http://www.hearthpwn.com/decks/8327-druid-no-rares
• Aggro-focused deck with commons, and some late-game finishing power: http://www.hearthpwn.com/decks/8490-druid-inexpesive-more-aggro